World of Flames
by RainShowers32571
Summary: Maya's dad comes back at the worst time; when everyone is figuring out how they feel about each other. Basically Girl Meets Texas (from the end of Part 2, then things aren't the same) blended with ideas that will probably be in Girl Meets the Forgiveness Project. Lucaya


I used to write FanFiction on another profile but I'm back and I'm using this profile now. I'm really hoping to finish this because it was always hard for me to do chapter stories but I'm older now. In this I blend Girl Meets Texas with Girl Meets the Forgiveness Project (you'll see what I mean). Part 3 of Girl Meets Texas really upset me so I wanted to change it up and I think this makes it more interesting but not less realistic. I hope you enjoy chapter 1!

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"I just don't want to have any more secrets from her."

She looked at him only for a second before looking back into the fire. Part of her wanted to disappear, but another part of her just wanted to stay there forever, looking into the fire. Everything felt right in that moment; she wasn't hiding anymore, but the consequences of not hiding were still hiding. She didn't want them to unfold. She didn't want to talk, she just wanted to stare into the fire.

He stared into the fire, too. After almost kissing her, it seemed he didn't want to try to talk anymore, either. Yet the silence between them wasn't uncomfortable. It was confusing, but it was still the silence that always was between them, confusing and waiting but still comfortable.

They stared into the fire for a long time, until it started to die, the embers fading into the night. It was probably almost midnight, but neither of them moved. Finally, Lucas looked up and said, "I know why you didn't want me to ride the bull."

She glanced at him, not sure what he was going to say. Did he know? Did he? Yes, she had told him it was because she couldn't stand the idea of something happening to him. But neither Riley nor Farkle nor Zay would have been able to handle something happening to him, and they watched. Yet Maya couldn't. She felt unsure about every reason why, but she just couldn't watch.

"You've been left before. You thought I was going to leave if I rode the bull. If I got hurt, I would have left you like your dad."

His voice was slow, but he didn't sound like he was confused. When he said it, it made sense to Maya; it made more sense than she wanted it to. She stared at him, blinking. He was so calm, but when she tried to breathe, her breath caught in her throat. "I don't know-"

"Maya, I know that's why. You know I'm never going to leave, right? Even if I had gotten hurt, it wouldn't be like your dad."

She continued to stare at him, wanting to say something but knowing she couldn't. He was right about the reason why she didn't want him to ride the bull. She knew he was right. She didn't know if she wanted him to be right, or if she cared that he was right, or if what he said mattered. She wanted to believe he was right about never leaving, but that was harder. You hope for things, you get disappointed, she thought, and immediately she couldn't stop thinking it. She opened her mouth, then shut it. "It's okay, Huckleberry," she said, after minutes. She didn't know what it meant, but it was all she could say.

He didn't seem to know what it meant either. He looked away for a second, then back into her eyes, and said carefully, "Maya, you know that. It's true."

She couldn't explain what she felt in that moment; it was the strangest mix of calmness and fear. She felt safe there with him, yet frightened of what he was saying. He didn't ask her to trust him, but she was scaring herself by trying. She bit her lip, and whispered, "It's okay, Huckleberry. Really." Then she stood up and walked away, her hands shaking. He didn't call after her, but she knew he wanted her to come back. She just kept walking, her cowboy boots making marks in the dark ground.

 _x/x/x/x/x_

The next morning, everyone was quiet. Maya knew she had to tell Riley what had happened at the campfire, but Riley didn't seem to want to know. Lucas still seemed frustrated with Riley's decision to call him her brother, but was less expressive about it. On the drive to the airport, no one spoke. Maya watched Texas under them as the plane took off. The sight was beautiful; the mixture of fields and long streets blended perfectly with the sunrise. She thought about when she had made herself believe in something in order to get the art program back. Lucas had told her he wanted her to be happy then. Zay had said Lucas called her "the blonde beauty."

What did it mean? She glanced across the aisle at Lucas, who was focused hard on the window on his, Farkle's, and Zay's side. He cared about her, didn't he? It only made sense. She had always thought he liked her, but now she just felt lost. She remembered all of Riley's words, saying she made fun of Lucas because she liked him. The idea of her liking Lucas obviously wasn't foreign to her, yet those words just felt wrong. Like was such a weak word; it was the kind of word you used for someone you'd just met and hardly knew. Of course Maya liked Lucas. She liked Riley, Farkle, and Zay, too. She treated them all differently, but she liked all of them. She loved all of them, even. The way she felt about Lucas was different. It was so strong, and so different from anything she had ever felt. He was like all of her friends, especially Riley, in that he made her feel safer–stronger. Yet she didn't feel so passionate about her other friends. She cared about all of them more than anyone, but she cared about Lucas differently. She was able to care about him the way she cared about her other friends, of course, but she cared about him so deeply in another way, too. And she knew that even if it was easier to pretend this didn't matter, and it was all in her head, she was unable to convince herself he didn't feel about her like she did. The things he said and the way he spoke to her were enough to make this clear.

Maya felt a nudge on her shoulder and flipped her head around towards Riley. Her best friend was smiling at her, and Maya realized she had been looking at Lucas for a long time. She started to tell Riley about what had happened at the campfire, but something stopped her. Now wasn't the right time. Now was the right time to just sit still and get back to New York City.

 _x/x/x/x/x_

Maya hadn't really expected things to be easier when they got home, but she hadn't expected them to be so much harder. She had felt like she needed to be alone ever since the night before, except now that she was alone she wanted to be with people again.

She stood in her room, looking into the mirror. She just stood there, examining her reflection. Two days ago, life had been normal. She looked the same as she did then, but it was a lie. It was all a lie. She wanted the world to be a lie, but it stayed there, stubbornly staying true no matter how hard she fixated on the mirror.

She heard her phone vibrate on her bed, and she pulled away from the mirror to check it. She had gotten a text from Riley, saying, "Do you want to come over and have a sleepover?"

Maya took a deep breath and sat down, not replying. She did want to go over to Riley's, because everything got fixed at Riley's. She wanted to be with Riley, and to hold up their friendship rings, and for everything to melt into nothing. The problem was, that wasn't going to happen. They were going to have to talk about things, and Riley was going to keep calling Lucas her brother and telling Maya she didn't need to know what happened. The amount Maya needed Riley to know what happened was immeasurable. She couldn't keep more secrets from her best friend. She couldn't. Riley's refusal to hear the secret was not enough to shake her need to tell it.

"Maya?" Maya's phone vibrated again with another text from Riley. She texted back, "Okay" and got up. Hiding wouldn't change what was going to have to happen eventually.

May started for her bedroom door when she heard a noise coming from another part of the apartment. She froze. She was home alone as usual, and nobody else was in the apartment. She pushed open the door slowly and called out, "Who's there?" Something felt terribly ominous, but she tried not to get scared. If hoping was bad, so was being afraid of things. She gripped the door with her hands and called out again.

"Maya, it's me!" the voice of Katy Hart flowed too welcomingly through Maya's door. Maya was confused as to why her mother was home, but she rushed out of her bedroom, relieved.

The dark apartment was very small, and Maya made her way to the front door in a few seconds. She was expecting to see just her mother, waiting to say hello to Maya, explain why she was home, and ask how Texas was. Instead, her mother stood stiffly beside a much taller man.

Maya's heart stopped. The room was suddenly spinning like a carousel, and the world went completely and utterly silent. She squeezed her eyes shut to stop the spinning, but it continued into the blackness of her own mind. She felt her hands grab frantically at the wall to stop from falling, but she couldn't remember ever moving them. She couldn't remember anything, her mind was blank. Then, she could remember everything. Every memory, every feeling she had ever felt, rushed into her thoughts all at once. Images of her childhood she'd thought she'd forgotten, horrible moments she'd intentionally forgotten, it all was coming back.

"Maya, your dad came back to see you."

Katy's words were like the match throw into spilling gasoline. Maya's feet slipped on the floor as she felt them backing up, her arms went limp as they let go of the wall. The carousel stopped, and it was replaced with a haunted house–unmoving but so much more terrifying.

The sound of a hard, heavy footstep towards her acted as a hard shove; she spun around automatically and ran, her own footsteps thudding against the thin, narrow floorboards. She didn't know why, but Lucas's words about her not watching him because she didn't want to be left again echoed in her head. They distorted as words of Riley and Farkle broke into the cavern of her mind, too. She slammed her door and ran for the fire escape, scrambling down further and further until she was no longer in that apartment, or anyone's apartment. She didn't want to be in any place that belonged to anyone. She wanted to be in the world that was no one's, because if it was no one's, no one could make her do things. No one could make her tell Lucas the way she was feeling. No one could make her trust them.

She had trusted her dad would never come back. She had wanted him to come back so badly for so long, but she had trusted he wouldn't. She had trusted he didn't want to. She had vowed never to believe in anything, but she couldn't help believing that she and her mother were alone forever. She had believed it so it didn't hurt her that he didn't come back, week after month after year. How could he have come back?

She stood underneath the fire escape, her hand on the metal of the stairs. She couldn't do this. It was too much. She knew things didn't ever happen at the right times, but it was too much. She remembered she was supposed to go to Riley's, but Riley's house felt too safe. The warmth and the light were something she loved, but she didn't want to go somewhere she loved and feel safe. She wasn't, not really. She took a step forward. It wasn't really the unknown, because she knew the streets of her neighborhood, but it wasn't the same as a comforting, safe place. Anything could happen in that world. And no one in that world would make her tell them that her dad was back. No one in that world would care.

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I hope you liked it and review if you want to =) Hopefully I'll get to the next chapter soon.  
My Instagram is _lucaya325.71 if you want to follow me!


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